Feet Love.

This is a little cute something my teacups in peony has been doing lately, and I thought I'd join in this week. Mr. Man and I relaxing in his room. :)

A Blog-oversary Celebration?

Wow. Already?

In less than a month, I will have been blogging here for a year. A YEAR, PEOPLE. Do you know how impossible it is for me to stick to anything for a week? Let alone a YEAR? This is a big deal!

So. Celebration. I want to do a giveaway. I know a lot of you guys are really awesome Etsy designers (and yes, I do stalk you and secretly want everything you make), so would any of you be interested in getting some more coverage here in a few weeks? We could feature one thing, a dozen things, whatever! Or, how about you photographers? A print, perhaps?

If this sounds like something you'd be interested in, email me at

beautifuliconoclast [at] gmail [dot] com

NOT [dot] comE like I seriously almost typed, haha. :) I'll probably also send out a few emails in a week or so, but if you're definitely interested let me know! I'm so excited about this and to hear from y'all!

On Being Totally Self-Conscious

Yeah. Me. Self-conscious. Sure, I'm conceited 90% of the time. I think I'm pretty hot stuff. It doesn't help that my friends pretty often complain about how boys throw themselves at me, which I honestly don't EVER notice, but having them tell me this is enough to boost my ego.

But right now is that other 5% of the time when I want to wear baggy clothes and curl up in a ball and not come out of my room until I'm somehow miraculously back down to the size 1/2 I was in high school.

I keep seeing (and hanging out with) pretty, skinny girls. I'm sure they were around during the winter too, but they were all bundled up in jackets and sweaters and it's harder to tell if someone's hiding a muffin top under their big snow jacket. But now they're out in droves, wearing itty bitty tank tops and short shorts and generally just looking hot, and I'm so just... not.

These are the girls I used to look like:

And, I mean, I am not fat by any means. But I'm not a size 1 or 2 anymore. And, honestly, this is getting me to a dangerous place in my life because I'm starting to count calories without thinking and telling myself, "Whoa, 1200 in a day? That's a lot, Valorie..." And while it's been years since I last was starving myself, I don't want to slip down the slope again. Because 1200 ISN'T a lot.

And yet, yeah, I DO want to wear short shorts without them riding up my leg, or wear a tight tank top without worrying about fat I look in it. I want to feel confident wearing a swim suit and not mind the fact that summer is coming up and soon the last thing I'm going to be wanting to do in Texas is wear clothes. You know? I want to be able to show a little midriff and be confident that people aren't disgusted and/or judging me. And I don't feel that way right now.

Yeah, it helps that Mr. Man tells me I'm pretty all the time. But still, I'd like to feel pretty for once, you know?

All this to say, I'm giving up cheese for a week. It's on my 101 in 1001 list anyways, and I know most of the fat/calories in my diet come from cheese. I'm not really sure how I'm going to pull this one off since I literally have cheese with every meal, but... I'm working out it. We'll see. I've also been doing the working out five times a week thing and it's definitely helped some -- I've already lost like two and a half pounds... but still.

Y'all get where I'm coming from, right?

Weekend Whoop!

Okay, back to the Weekend Whoop this week! Get excited! Don't forget, you should TOTALLY participate, Aggie or not. Whoooop! is for awesome things that happened, while tssss is for lame things that t-sips do. :)

Friday: I got out of class at 10:20 (my 2:30 class was cancelled) which was AWESOME. I spent the most of the day running errands and lame things, but I got to study with my good friend Mollee that afternoon for a while. That night, she and I went to a shindig with a bunch of friends, which ended in a 2 am IHOP run, which, let's be honest here, is always the best way to end a night. (That's Tim being a messy eater. He's fun.) Whoooop!

Saturday: In the morning, I went to the gym and had a really tough workout that I'm still pretty stinkin' sore from. But that was awesome. Whoooop! I then drove up to Waco to see Mr. Man. He had the day off, so we had lunch together and went for a walk down by the Brazos River. (That is the river that runs through Waco, right?) We totally walked across a bridge that we definitely weren't supposed to and almost died in the process, but I've got this new-found need to try everything once, so I was all for it. Whoooop!

You can't tell in this photo, but he's telling me to stop taking pictures and hurry up. We see how that went. :)

I have this new obsession with photos of people walking away from the camera. I'm not sure why, but I dig it. What do y'all think? These ducks were AWESOME. They let us get close enough to touch them. They were so cute, like a couple. :)

That night, I also went and saw Bounty Hunter with a few friends. It was kind of predictable, but really good, see it if you get the chance. :)

Sunday: Ugh. Studying all day long. I have two tests this week, so it had to happen. It sucked though. :( tssssss. That's about all I've got for you for today.

How was your weekend? :)

Well, I Always Did Want to Flip a Car, pt. 3

I just realized that I never explained what the heck the title of this series of posts meant. (Check out Part 1 and Part 2 if this makes no sense to you.)

You guys are going to think we're sick.

Here's the thing -- Mr. Man is kind of a thrill-seeker. And I'm sort of an adrenaline junkie. Meaning, we do stuff like jump off the roofs of our houses, and take 150 foot free falls at carnivals, and both of our "back-up life plans" have something to do with being stunt drivers. So, while, yes, the wreck was terrifying. And yes, B-Fray did get hurt and that's awful. And yes, it was dangerous, and horrible, and we're beyond lucky to be alive. But, looking back, the actual act of flipping, of being totally off the ground and not controlled by gravity, was kind of... fun. Once I knew I was safely on the ground, and still breathing, and not harmed, and B-Fray was still conscious and okay, I could admit that it was kind of cool that we walked away from that unscathed, kind of like in an action movie.

And so, when we got home, and had a moment to breathe, and knew B-Fray was safe in his bed, Mr. Man looked at me and said, "Well, I always did want to flip a car."

So that's that story. Now if you want to see photos of the Jeep post-wreck, Mr. Man's mom had to take some for insurance and sent them to me. If you don't want to see them, I'd navigate away from the page now.

My view from inside the car. Thankfully, they cleaned up all B-Fray's blood.

This was the only window that stayed remotely intact.

Yeah. We're lucky to be alive.